Sorry to disagree with Libertarian Wisdom from on high, but libertarian belief in the free market is at best hopelessly naive, and at worst, pro-greed
and cynical. Yes, BAD government policy can make matters worse. But, for better or for worse, the only hope is that our government can intercede
intelligently to avert economic disaster.

Thursday's defeat of the modest loan to the Big Three doesn't bode well, particularly given that the motive of the Republican resistance is
union-busting, a goal of the Right for decades. However, it appears that even the incompetent President Bush is NOW willing to use some of the 700
billion already pledged to help the auto industry. Let's hope so. If the auto industry fail (and that possibility is real), America will be in a
world of hurt.

Do the auto manufacturers deserve help? No. But the American workers deserve the help, and that's the crux of this issue.

Originally posted by Anonymous ATS
Sorry to disagree with Libertarian Wisdom from on high, but libertarian belief in the free market is at best hopelessly naive, and at worst, pro-greed
and cynical. Yes, BAD government policy can make matters worse.

Forget Libertarianism, start thinking StateLESS.

Naive? I think not.

The more I think of it, anarchy has a bad rep, but is starting to make sense more every day.

May I ask why the government would do that exactly and how is killing everyone goijng to help them? If that would be the case, they would have done
that years ago. They have the technology to do it. write me at erniemusic2 at yahoo dot com

Wonderful post! - Applies to Coast to Coast AM too! (I'd tell them that, but I cannot even afford a phone as I'm always working on my computer,
because THIS IS CRUNCH TIME AND A HALF! POST MESSAGES ABOUT THE PROOF OF TRUTH EVERYWHERE OUTSIDE IN YOUR COMMUNITY! - THE MASSES WHO DON'T EVEN GO
ONLINE NEED TO SEE THAT THEY SHOULD.

- And to reply to the OP: It is ALL intentionally being caused by the shadow government, the bloodlines that have ruled this planet for thousands of
years, & whatever 'solution' to the problem they created will only amplify the situation, naturally... I'd post my website, but I don't want to be
accused of spam, so if you REALLY can put 2 & 2 together, you will find the site in below top secret's webmaster section.

One of the posters mentioned "if you have US $, you're gonna be screwed."

I am not going to doubt this at all- but what happens to those of us on fixed incomes, where all we can basically AFFORD is the few dollars we get per
month? Where does that leave the disabled, the elderly, ect? Screwed sideways?

The Bible in Revelation Chapters 13 and 17 show a scenario of a one world government, specifically Revelation 13 and verses 3, 8 and 13. I see
government/government interference growing bigger, even in the 8 yrs of a Republican administration (which usally touts smaller government/government
interference).

Governent is what you make of it. Either you fight for control of government, or you doom yourself to be ruled by the greedy and the ruthless.
Government is either the problem or the solution.

Corporations are feudalistic entities, and these entities are what is creating all the problems in our current economy. We have had a free market
president for the last eight year, most of which has had free market people in control of congress, and the result has been the destruction of our
economy.

Mass hordes of people predicted this current depression, which is what we are currently going through, and most of them were democrats.

There is no such thing as a free market, the term is an oxymoron. Economies do not function well without an evenly enforced fair set of rules. What
we have with this foolish attempt to create a free market system is a new socialisitic system, similar to the USSR and current China, where elites
control the government, and create a socialistic system that only supports the elites. It is the neocons, the republican party, the conservatives who
have created this monster all built up on the con of reaganomics. It is a quasi fascism/communism style government.

The only known solution is for the people to take back control of the government, and make the government start working for them once again. Anarchy
is not the solution, and if that is the only solution you see, then you need to re-examine your position.

The U.S. economy does not feed off of the rest of the world. Seriously! Do you really think that the people of the first world nations should live
like people in third world nations? We are not suffering from a supply problem in the economic equation, we are suffering from a demand problem.
Modern technology enables us to provide all the goods necessary for us to live fabulous lifestyles, BUT not if we live in a system where elites
control production and distribution. Currently, the only way for the people to express their will is through government, but that means that we must
fight to control our government.

The problem of the third world is that the people do not have control of their governments, and elites control everything. You either learn to fight
for your rights, or you are doomed to become a sheople.

Originally posted by SkepticOverlord
This snippet is, in my opinion, the most compelling thing we've heard from any ATS MIX interview... Not only is our economy in trouble, but our individual liberties and private property rights are under attack. And the more power we succeed to
the government, under the hope that the government will use that power benevolently to help us... that's not what's going to happen. They're going
to use the power against us, and not only are we going to loose our financial wealth, we're going to loose our freedoms. And if we don't have our
freedoms, we're never going to get our economy back.

To be honest the public is not blameless in this, not at all. The public is addicted to consumerism, cheap goods, cheap oil and cheap credits. The
real danger is also that the masses will deny that they're also guilty. Even if you have a good government, if they try to cut your addiction, you
will only remove them from power and find someone who's more "cooperative".

Funny though, the media does blame a lot of entities, but few or none ever also blame the public. Ignorance becomes a necessity, eh.

If the govt is so concerned about bailing out everyone and getting people jobs and free markets and starting businesses and loans and mortgages.
Why instead of needing 800 billion. Why don't they just give all the legal citizens of this country 1 million each!
Screw these $1000 checks Bush hands out - Give me a million. Everyone would be buying new cars, houses, businesses small and large.
That will only cost 1/2 a billion dollars. Now thats sounds more economically stimulating - then this crap check Bush sends out!!!
Enrich the country by enriching the hard working people of our nation. But the Govt is just a hoax any damn way - why would they want to help us out,
thats what were here for - to keep bailing them out!!! Their bastards who have ruined this country and are ruining the world!

To be honest the public is not blameless in this, not at all. The public is addicted to consumerism, cheap goods, cheap oil and cheap credits. The
real danger is also that the masses will deny that they're also guilty. Even if you have a good government, if they try to cut your addiction, you
will only remove them from power and find someone who's more "cooperative".

Funny though, the media does blame a lot of entities, but few or none ever also blame the public. Ignorance becomes a necessity, eh.

Exactly. The public will not act responsibly until we have passed the tipping point. Then of course it is too late to avert the on-coming natural
disaster. Since the 1960s Ford, GM and Chrysler have made a series of small cars, some of good engineering and quality of build, but the public
refused to buy them. Ford Falcon, Chevy Nova, Plymouth Valiant, etc.

Following another oil shortage in the 1980s Ford, GM and Chrysler downsized their cars substantially. Again the public said NO! As time progressed,
American automotive tastes changed so that the F150 and its GM and Chrysler counterparts became the vehicle of choice alongside the SUVs mounted on
the truck chassis, the Big 3 looked viable.

Then the unholy alliance of OPEC, ExxonMobil and unrestrained speculators laden with cash from 97 million workers weekly contributions into
unsupervised 401(k) plans, gasoline hit $4+ a gallon and a small revolt ensued. We blamed Ford, GM and Chrysler for not making more economical
vehicles. Well, you know all that as well as I do so I’ll stop here, but I have to add a post I meant to put elsewhere but I’m getting lazy (and
tired).

Oh, before I quit, in 1939-1940 Ford offered a downsized 2.5 liter V8 of 60 horsepower knock-off of its standard 3.6 liter 85 hp V8 in their full
sized cars. In 1941 Ford replaced that anemic engine with a much better performing flat head inline 6 of 3.5 liters. (The 2.5 was last seen in the top
of the line French Simca made in the late 1940s). Because of competition - top selling Chevy’s 6 was rated at 85 hp - Ford rated its new 6 also at
85 hp and bumped its traditional V8 first to 90 then to 100 hp, both numbers produced in the advertising department and not the engineering
department. The Ford 6 outperformed the V8 up to about 75 mph and gave higher mpg at any speed. End.

"Not only is our economy in trouble, but our individual liberties and private property rights are under attack. And the more power we cede to
the government, under the hope that the government will use that power benevolently to help us . . that's not what's going to happen. They're going
to use the power against us and not only are we going to loose our financial wealth, we're going to loose our freedoms. And if we don't have our
freedoms, we're never going to get our economy back."

Mr. Schiff (and his estimable mentor Dr. Ron Paul) make one pertinent mistake. Their solution is worse than the problem.

If you harken back to what our economy was in 1929, about 120 million people still feeding ourselves (and a lot of the world) with the produce of the
long since departed family farm, the US was just turning ANTI a lot of things including immigrants.

Then fast forward to 1933. Everything changed for the better. Allow me one example. Housing. A basic industry. Tagged with responsibility for the
current economic debacle. Good banking practices in the pre-1933 era required 50% down payment on a house. To stimulate the private housing industry
that was almost entirely small businesses, the New Deal created the FHA - Federal Housing Administration.

The major change brought on by the FHA was the reduction in the buyer's down payment to 10%. Great for borrowers. But what about the people with the
money, the lenders? The FHA said, ‘we will insure the mortgage.’ So who pays the insurance premium? FDR was no socialist, so he said, ‘let the
BORROWERS pay the premiums.’ The FHA insured home loans had a half percentage point added to the rate for mortgage insurance. From 1933 until the
1980s, no lender ever lost one penny on an FHA insured home mortgage. About a half century. Around the world, the American owner occupied home
mortgage became a safe investment good next to GOD.

The second and less noticed benefit from the FHA was uniform rules of construction for new housing. All 48 states. (Before Alaska and Hawaii). You
could move from Portland Maine to Portland Oregon and expect to find similar housing. The rules? Minimal room sizes were established. Inside bathrooms
with flushing toilets. Central heat. Utility closets for the water heater. Vented attics. Roof gutters. Waterproofed basements. A stoop or porch at
the front door. A window in every room. An electric outlet on every wall. Switches by the door. A closet in each bedroom and if there is an entry
hall, one there too. Water, gas and electric service piped in during construction. But the genius of FDR was that NO ONE builder was forced to do it
his way. But you could not get an FHA loan on a house that did not comply with the rules. So compliance was purely voluntary.

Americans tend to think housing standards are local. Some are, but the very first standards and the rules that made the American housing market the
largest and soundest in the world ever, were products of the New Deal and FHA. THAT was the way America got to be the country with the highest
percentage of owner occupied housing, with the enactment of the FHA in 1933.

Then along come those who don’t like rules and regulations. Too much interference. They convinced the Reagan Administration to begin taking down
those rules and regulations. Privatize the home loan market they urged. Let the market work its wonders said the Milton Friedman types. Fire the staff
at the regulatory agencies if you can’t repeal the laws outright.

I lied. Here is one more example of the genius of the New Deal. While we speak of bank failures in a cavalier fashion today it was not always that
way. In fact, many people today are experiencing what it was like BEFORE 1933. Can you imagine the gloom that would strike a frugal person who had
saved for his old age only to wake up to learn his bank had failed? Savings of a lifetime were wiped out overnight. That happened in Germany and gave
the world Adolph Hitler. Fortunately while it also happened in the United States, we got Franklin Delano Roosevelt. We were lucky, Germany and the
world was not.

The New Deal gave us the FDIC. (And its companion FSLIC). Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation and Federal Savings and Loan Insurance Corporation.
Staring at $2,500 in 1933 the FDIC insured deposits in any bank (or S&L) that would campy with sound banking practices as set forth by the FDIC. If
the bank would consent to that, then they could advertise by posting the FDIC logo at their front door. After the bank holiday imposed by fiat by FDR,
he did not re-open ALL banks but only SOUND banks. One easy way to be classified as a SOUND bank was to join the FDIC. Needless to say, most banks
VOLUNTARILY joined the FDIC.

So who pays the premiums for this potentially large loss? The banks! On the last banking day of each month, the bank reports its deposits. At the
beginning of the system the assessment was one-half of one percent of deposits. When the FDIC determined by accepted actuarial methods there was
suffice money on hand to insure the public, the assessments were suspended.

Although banks could not directly pass the assessment on to costumers no one is dumb enough to think this cost item did not go into the banks
calculations of fees to be charged for its services. Note: To offset the assessments, the FDIC allowed banks to use 25% of customers deposits as
collateral for overnight loans from the Fed.

The amount insured was gradually raised to $100,000 and in the recent bank panic was raised to $250,000 temporarily. I expect that will be made
permanent in the next Congress. No depositor has ever lost a cent (up to the insured amount) since 1933.

Then not surprising, as part of the privatizing and deregulating mania the notion of SOUND BANKING PRACTICES was given up begriming in the 1980s. We
mixed investment banks - speculators - with commercial banks. Privatize! Deregulate! That was the mantra. And here we are today, puzzled over what
happened to us, as if 1929 never happened.

Who was it who said “If you don’t know your history you are doomed to repeat it.”

Excellent summation, banking de-regulation is essentially our current biggest problem, but not the root cause. Free economics tactics failed
miserably. Government certainly is part of the problem, maybe the biggest part, but I doubt it. Corporations and the dastardly deeds that are pulled
behing the mask of the faceless entity of the corporation are probably a far larger problem. Corporations can not be held accountable because the
people who commit these acts are extremely dificult to identify, therefore the perps usually get away when committing crimes hiding behind corporate
entities.

Jazzguy, I agree the people of the U.S., and the people all over the planet in general have gotten spoiled, and gotten lazy, and we are all part of
the problem.

I wrote a book titled "A Westerner's Tenets for Modern Living" where my biggest point is that in our current modern world, at least in the first
world nations, our success is forcing us to change in a way that life on Earth has probably never had to deal with, and that is life without the
struggle for survival. Yeah, I know I am plugging my own book, but this is a concept of mine, as far as I am aware of, that others are not
addressing, and I think that this is the central problem we as a species are currently facing, and I think I deserve credit for some of my own ideas.
Sure, we still have to do many things to survive, but most of our concerns are about how well we will live, how big our house will be and how fancy
the car we drive will be. The wolf isn't at our door, it's not even in our geographical region any more.

IMO, the real danger is far more complicated, and has more to do with achieving the next level of advancement.

The real danger is not the government'' by the people,for the people''but rather the private sector which has taken over the government,in order
to eventualy become the government.We should not fear a represenitive government,but we should be terrified of an eleite private sector which seeks to
commercialize every aspect of life,''in the name of freedom','using a sold out, bought out, government that is only responsive to the greed of the
corperate globalists.

Forced taxation of private earnings is an evil second only to being forced to pay for that which nature has given freely thanks to the fact that the
private sector has claimed ownership over even nature.

Government is basicaly like a two eged sword.A government that is represenitive of all the people can protect the people from enslavement.That same
government when controled by capitalist interests alone can serve to enforce slavery.

Tyranny need not always originate with government or repressive legislation passed by government.Tyranny is also a condition in which a given
populace,and the needs and desires of that populace are subserviant to the laws of the market place as oppossed to the laws of cival scociety.

i just think that it is awesome that peter schiff was willing to come on ats mix and answer our questions. i dont care what anybody says, ive been
listening to him for a while now and while he isnt 100% right all the time he is damn close. just think of all the stuff he was right about in the
last couple years and if he keeps this trend up we are in for some serious #. stock up on food, ammo, precious metals and whatever else floats your
boat.

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